Why Most Agencies Fail: No-BS Marketing with Ivan Janku, Digital Rocket

In this episode of Inside Marketing with MarketSurge, Reed Hansen sits down with Ivan Janku, CEO of Digital Rocket, the agency famously allergic to marketing waste.

Ivan and his team have helped e-commerce and SaaS brands generate over $250M in client revenue by fixing profit leaks across ads, CRO, email, and tracking. What makes Digital Rocket different? Their No-BS Guarantee: If they don’t deliver, you don’t pay.

This conversation is raw, practical, and unapologetically focused on what actually makes money.

💡 What You’ll Learn:

• Why most agencies fail by working in silos
 • The most common profit leaks killing e-commerce and SaaS brands
 • Why ROI is one of the most overrated marketing metrics
 • How bad tracking breaks attribution and decision-making
 • What founders should audit before scaling ad spend
• How Ivan allocates ad budgets across Meta, Google, TikTok, and SMS
• Why systems and checklists beat “rockstar” marketers every time

👉 Key Highlights:

✅ No-BS Marketing – Why Ivan only gets paid when results show up
✅ The Leaky Bucket Problem – Where revenue disappears between ads and conversion
✅ Mobile UX Blind Spots – Why desktop-first thinking costs brands millions
✅ Tracking Before Tactics – Why server-side tracking is non-negotiable
✅ Channel Strategy Reality – Matching platforms to buying behavior
✅ Systems > Talent – How checklists scale agencies without chaos

🧠 About the Guest

Ivan Janku is the CEO of Digital Rocket, a performance-driven growth agency helping e-commerce and SaaS brands eliminate wasted ad spend and scale profitably. Known for his direct style and obsession with accountability, Ivan has built Digital Rocket around systems, audits, and real business outcomes—not vanity metrics.

🔗 Company Website: https://digitalrocketads.com
🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ecommerce-megalomania/?originalSubdomain=rs

📈 At MarketSurge, we help you turn tools into systems — and systems into growth.
If you want marketing automation that feels personal and performs like a team of 10, you’re in the right place.

🧠 Want to talk strategy or see it in action?
 🎯 Book your 15-minute Value or Free Coffee Call:
 👉 https://link.marketsurge.io/widget/bookings/15minutevalueorfreecoffee

🔗 Useful Links
🌐 Website: https://marketsurge.io
🐦 X / Twitter: https://x.com/marketsurging
💼 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/marketsurgeio
🎙️ Podcast: https://marketsurge.transistor.fm/

Creators and Guests

Host

Reed Hansen

Reed Hansen is a seasoned digital marketing executive with a proven track record of driving business growth through innovative strategies. As the Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge, he focuses on leveraging AI-powered marketing tools to help businesses scale efficiently. Reed's expertise spans from leading startups to Fortune 500 companies, making him a recognized authority in the digital marketing space. His unique ability to combine data-driven insights with creative solutions has been instrumental in achieving remarkable sales growth for his clients. ​

What is Inside Marketing with MarketSurge?

Welcome to Inside Marketing with MarketSurge — your front-row seat to the boldest business insights, marketing breakthroughs, and entrepreneurial real talk.

Hosted by Reed Hansen, Chief Growth Officer at MarketSurge and a digital marketing veteran who's helped scale everything from scrappy startups to Fortune 500 giants, this podcast dives deep into what’s really moving the needle in today’s marketing world. Find us at Marketsurge.io

Each week, we’ll break down the latest marketing and business news (minus the fluff), explore tech trends you actually need to know, and feature unfiltered conversations with the most interesting minds in entrepreneurship and marketing.

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Subscribe, tune in, and let’s scale something legendary. 🚀

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hello
and welcome back to Inside

Marketing with Market Surge.

And today we're talking with the man
who's allergic to marketing waste.

Yvonne Yoku.

Yvonne's, the CEO of Digital Rocket,
where he and his team have helped

e-commerce and SaaS brands fix their
biggest profit leaks across ads,

email, CRO, and tracking and generate
over 250 million in client revenue.

agency is known for their no
BS warranty, meaning if they

don't deliver, you don't pay.

That's very refreshing.

It's really marketing accountability
taken to a whole new level.

So grab your notebook because this is
going to be very raw data-driven, and

it is going to be packed with gold.

Yvonne Yoku, welcome to the show.

Ivan Janku: Thank you very much.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Well,
so you, we were talking briefly

before we started recording.

You've been doing this for over 10 years.

This is the only industry,
you know, you're an expert.

What got you started in marketing
and how did that evolve into

you launching digital Rocket?

Ivan Janku: Well, I was actually
like a couple of years since I turned

18, I was in fitness and so I tried
to hire an agency to help me launch

ads for my fitness coach program
that they had, and it was just

like me helping people lose weight.

And I just remember that the agencies
gave me just likes, and those

likes weren't even from my city.

It were actually from a country
next to us, so I was just

shocked at what they did.

Like, like not a single
customer, nothing happened.

They were just like
bullshit to me nonstop.

And it was like a couple hundred dollars
in a total for the agency and everything.

It was just a, like a whole
experience was insane.

And I just wanted to quit the weight
loss industry because I was just.

Sick and tired of people moaning
and not putting in the work.

So I went to another industry where
most people moan and don't put

in the work, which is advertising
marketing, but you get me how it is.

Like I, I just saw an opportunity where
most people didn't actually put in

the work and are not diligent enough.

And I just was like.

This could be me and I.

That's how I started.

I worked with local businesses and
then quickly, because local businesses

weren't really that great, I started
working online through Upwork.

And that was like the first three years.

And I was top rated at Upwork,
top 1% on digital marketing.

And since then I partnered
with multiple agencies.

We white labeled for them, and we've
helped a lot of businesses scale

in the last nine years since we
started Digital Rocket as an agency.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Fantastic.

So, you know, obviously that there's a
moment where you realize that a lot of

agencies are selling like Bologna or bs.

how did you settle on key marketing
metrics that really mattered?

What were some of the key metrics early on
that you, thought were really important?

Ivan Janku: So when we started with a
typical agency that just did Facebook ads,

and when you're just looking at the world
from the perspective of Facebook ads, like

you try solving everything through that,
but quickly enough as we expanded, like we

noticed that the website sometimes failed.

We used the stuff like heat maps.

We just see issues and you know,
like sometimes it's obvious like if

the button click doesn't work, the
website doesn't convert and that's it.

So sometimes it's simple, but in
other situations it's nuances that

can change the game completely.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Ivan Janku: The biggest change for us
was just to expand outside of thinking

about a silo channel and started to
actually do what the business needed

to, and that's actually what they think
is the biggest problem in the market.

It's either that the agency in general
doesn't know what they're doing and

they're just winging it and hoping
they're gonna figure it out as they go.

And often that doesn't work.

But another problem is, is they
might be really good at what they do.

But you as the business owner, had to
make the right decision who to call

in, and you called in the wrong expert.

And so now that expert's trying to
fix the problem with the wrong tools.

So that's why a holistic understanding,
a holistic method of just understanding

the whole business, the whole p and
l, how the whole KPIs mount up to

the money at the end of the month.

But yeah, most businesses try to just
simplify it with ROI and that's it.

So it's not a linear answer they can give.

It's just like depending on the business

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

no.

And I mean, I think that makes a
lot of sense and you, but like, as

every business is different, you
know, they're going to have different

key metrics that matter, but it's
important that you have a partner that

Ivan Janku: Exactly.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
that spends time on that.

Now you've mentioned
your no BS philosophy.

You don't charge if you don't deliver.

how do you ensure that that's a good
model for both you and your client?

Ivan Janku: So it is a model that was
recently tested out mainly because most

clients that came to us have went through
three or four or five agencies, and

then either the agencies over promise
and deliver, and just the clients are,

you can imagine like an ex-girlfriend
that went through a really couple of bad

breakups and like, the guys lie cheating
or now she's supposed to trust you.

You didn't do a single
thing bad, so how do you.

Figure that minefield.

What we've ended up doing is just focusing
on data documentation and just keeping

everything organized in a simple way.

So what we do is do the holistic audit,
or what we call the no waste audit

of the business, and try to figure
out how the funnel works, how the ads

work, how the emails work, and get the
whole understanding of what the user

experience on the other side does.

At the end of the day, we just run.

As a user, try to buy stuff or sign
up, and we just look at the unnecessary

friction that the customer goes through.

And most businesses actually don't
fail because, there's something

completely broken, but there's
just too much friction in between.

And on top of, there's a lot of
leakage in between like Facebook

ads and the, like, the website and
the Google doesn't cover everything.

Then there's no email.

So you can imagine how much
potential revenue is lost and that

potential revenue ends up being
the thing that kills the business.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

Well that takes us to the next topic
and something that you've mentioned is

your audits maybe let's expand a little
bit on what those audits look like.

is this something you do?

Upfront, do you do this as a standalone
offering or is this something

offered only to engage clients?

Tell us how that works.

Ivan Janku: the whole concept of
the guarantee is that when we do

the audit, we will map out all of
the problems, all of the issues, all

the business needs to go through.

for example, if the website
needs changing, we'll

explain what needs changing.

often websites, critical information or
options for payment and stuff like that.

And so we offer to the customer,
if you don't know how to do this

yourself, we can do this for you.

websites are custom, but for everything
else, we have fixed different fees.

The whole point being is that we map out
all of things that need to be changed

and offered to implement the changes.

our offer to you is for exact work.

We're not.

Gatekeeping the information from
you because we give it to you in

the audit, and we do have some
businesses that just do the auditing

because they have an in-house team.

Then they implement everything
themselves, but often enough they

end up sending us the most referrals.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Hmm.

Okay.

No, that makes a lot of sense.

So, you're finding profit leaks, You
know, you've done many of these now.

what are some of the most common
profit leaks you're seeing?

you mentioned friction.

Are there, other things that you just see
over and over again that, e-commerce or

SaaS companies are making mistakes with?

Ivan Janku: Yeah, so I'll
give you a per example.

The average business owner age is like,
what, 45, 50, something like that.

So those guys are okay with the phones,
but they're not that used to it.

So what do you think?

What are they focusing on when
they're building a website?

The desktop.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
Yeah, the desktop.

Ivan Janku: You can imagine.

So like everybody just focuses on
the desktop and the desktop looks

amazing, and then you open it
from the phone and it's wrecked.

And so those guys were paying Facebook
ads, Google ads, stuff like that,

and they, whenever they had a problem
with the website, they just open the

laptop and you know, you can do the
right click, expect element to see

it through Chrome, even like that.

But most people don't know
that and don't use it.

So you end up sending a lot of
money to basically leaky bucket.

It just all just ends up not converting
and because just you just didn't

look at the actual user experience.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Right, right.

Ivan Janku: Most people are not
diligent enough to go through what

they did, how the experiences.

I would even look at, like if I was the
business owner and add a minimum once a

quarter, I would check out the heat maps
and I would do a couple of fake purchases.

You can also make like a discount
code that only you know and just

do like a hundred percent off
and just buy something yourself.

And through that you will get the
whole experience of exactly what

your customer needs to go through.

And often enough when we make
customers do that themselves.

They end up being pissed off
that they didn't do it earlier.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
Yeah, I can imagine.

Ivan Janku: It's quite obvious to find

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

very common problem that people don't
even try it once, you know, they just,

say it and forget it, essentially.

So now you've worked
with ads for a long time.

I'd be curious your perspective on
how Google ads and meta ads, how their

performance has changed over time.

I mean, I've been a, client of Meta Ads
for a very long time, and, I definitely

have my insights, but what do you think
from your perspective has been the

biggest changes in the last 10 years?

Ivan Janku: So the biggest changes are
usually towards data and data processing.

So what we had is a lot of
changes in the laws, plus a lot

of changes in the algorithm.

So the biggest changes were GDPR
change, where they introduced

capi, which most businesses
didn't have a good transition to.

And we still to this year, see.

Companies that are running ads
with just the pixel, no service

side tracking, nothing set up.

For your listeners, a good
advice is to check out state io.

That's a really cool tool that
can set up the service side

tracking and it's like $10 a month.

So you can imagine that if you
don't set up the data properly

to all of the channels and now.

As we are going through this, data
is becoming more and more complex.

The algorithms don't have what they
need so they're not able to optimize.

So if you didn't set up the
service side tracking, you're done.

And people are now more and more focusing
about Andromeda and stuff like that.

And I had a couple of calls even this
last week where people are talking

about Roed and we just found that the
basic pixel wasn't even said properly.

So it was just kinda weird how
people are just looking at what is

the new thing, but they forget what
is the foundation of their growth.

That's.

A stable data system

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

No, I mean, do you find similar
things with Google as well?

Like, are people neg

Ivan Janku: Exactly.

With Google it's a bit different
because Google introduced P max,

which the shopping campaigns and
stuff like that, but Google's.

Basically a necessity for most businesses.

If you don't run branded
campaign, anyone can bid on you.

So that's a problem.

So most businesses are basically
blackmailed like that to advertise.

And then because of that you
are gonna run Google anyways.

And I kind of think that Google just by
itself is a backbone, but it's the first.

Traffic acquisition tool gonna give
you a limitation when it comes to,

like, you cannot expand towards people
that don't know about your product.

You only can go for people
that are searching for your

product or something similar.

And most of your competition
is first gonna hit Google.

So if you don't have the money, or if
you're not first in the market, Google

is gonna be an uphill battle where you
have to combine building landing pages,

SEO, and doing PPC campaigns, because
there's relevant score and stuff like that

where if you don't have the keyword set
up properly on the landing page, you're

gonna be outbid by somebody that did, and
your cost of advertising just goes up.

And then basically, again,
additional friction.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Right.

Okay.

So now if you were you know, I'd
be curious, you know, if you were

starting a, a new brand from scratch
where would you allocate most of your

funds from an advertising standpoint?

Would you be, you know, between
Google Meta and maybe other platforms?

what do you think are the most
valuable investments right now?

Ivan Janku: So we did a lot of
different strategies from Google,

meta, TikTok, stuff like that.

And there are a couple of like
skies that we use or templates

depending on the type of the product.

So if we have as an example, something
that's clickbaity, something that's an

impulse like a fidget per that's gonna go
on meta, that's gonna go on TikTok, but

that's not gonna go that well on Google
because the product margins are gonna be

low and the competition is gonna be high,
which is gonna eat up the profit margin.

So stuff like that, but you need
to get a lot of creative, ideally a

lot of influencers to also help out.

And then through that you expand faster.

If you're selling something
that's a normal product, like

let's say incorporating services,
paperwork, stuff like that.

That stuff you should do through Google,
LinkedIn, and just the linear stuff,

because you cannot go through meta
and advertise something that somebody

needs once, like a company corporation.

You do it once and you don't do it
again for a long time, hopefully.

And then the last thing that I would
point out is that you have advertising

towards millennials and 18 plus, which is
mostly like cosmetics and stuff like that.

That goes really well on TikTok.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.

Ivan Janku: Those things.

I think that, everybody's running, just
focusing on creative, but an untapped

source of just making money text messages
combining with, heavy TikTok ads, because

those millennials don't open email,
that's fine, but targeting them through

text messages is then gonna help you get
the top of mind, and that's basically

substitute for email for younger people.

So you can think about, for example, your
phone number as your digital ID number.

Because you use your phone number
for two factor notification and

so like if you don't have your
phone number, you cannot get in.

So ergo, that could be your id.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, that makes sense.

So now you, in Europe, obviously you
have special data privacy challenges

with regulation from the last

Ivan Janku: Mm-hmm.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Do you
anticipate that, say, in the us you know,

most of my listeners are based in the us.

do you expect that we need to prepare
for similar, similar restrictions

on data privacy here, or do you
think that, we will be able to

continue to operate as we have

Ivan Janku: So I've seen a lot
of changes in that front as well.

We have for, for example, a lot of
lawyers, immigration lawyers, or

even pension tax refund companies,

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Okay.

That's,

Ivan Janku: yeah, I forgot about an NDA.

And we have also tax consultants
that we work with and people,

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: fine.

That's

Ivan Janku: I

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: I'll,

Ivan Janku: completely about this.

Thank you.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
bookmarked it, so we'll take it out.

Ivan Janku: I cannot say pension
tax because that's one of our

bigger clients and it's just like
a big company that's really strict.

About what, like what we say.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge:
Yeah, No problem.

We'll, clip this out.

Ivan Janku: so companies like immigration
lawyers and stuff like that have been

under a lot of changes because they're
set up to be a limited, uh, type of

advertisement or a special category.

And because of that.

We also had some, uh, advertising
clients that were in cannabis.

So cannabis saw drinks and
chocolates and stuff like that.

And even when we advertise cannabis dog
treats, we get through a lot of problems.

So you can imagine things like
that will probably change.

As we go, weirdly enough, you can sell
alcohol like this, no problem at all.

cannabis is just a big problem to
advertise, but there are always

different types of workarounds.

So if you want, I can even give
you an example of how we advertised

cannabis through Facebook, even
though we kept getting banned.

So anytime that we tried to advertise,
directly a website that was selling

those products, it was a problem
because it just didn't allow us.

But what we could do is build a
blog website, which is basically.

Similar name and then we
made blog articles about it.

And then you can run website
traffic and stuff like that.

Even potentially conversion campaigns,
depending on if they catch or not.

But basically what you do is you
hyperlink a couple of keywords to the

website so they can, through the blog,
go to your main shop store, and then

you can still track those through Google
Analytics who bought and who didn't.

It's not great, it's not
precise, but it's still a way to

advertise through meta when you.

Get banned or stuff like that.

Just bake a blog, run traffic to it,
and you're gonna get some people to it.

but it's still not gonna
perform like meta regularly.

Does.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Yeah.

Yeah.

No, that's good.

That's great advice.

And I, I like the thinking.

So on a slightly different topic,
you are bringing in very skilled

professionals, to, you know, implement
these, these audits, these strategies,

you know, the things that, that you do
to help your clients make more money.

do you maintain a solid pipeline of talent
to keep being able to do this and grow?

Like how, where, where do
you source people from?

Do, are you training them
within your company or are

you recruiting heavily from.

Other other agencies?

How does that work?

Ivan Janku: So we're one of
the strongest agencies around

when it comes to this business.

So we usually have a steady flow of people
applying to our work, but still that

skill level that we require is quite.

Hard to find and rare.

So often enough, we end up deciding
to find people that are really

a fit to our company culture.

And so that's direct talking.

No bullshit, nothing sacred.

Those are some of our company values.

because if I make a mistake,
everybody can speak up and ask

questions, stuff like that.

Mainly because if you don't
have that, then everybody's.

Afraid to speak up and things.

We don't want people that are silent Yes.

Doers and stuff like that.

Because we focus on building
systems, We don't have people to

say, Hey, we need to fix something.

The system might go explode at some point.

So what we end up doing is
training people from zero.

Most of the time, but sometimes we
end up getting really good talent.

But the main driving force is the
systems and massive checklists.

So anytime we onboard a new customer, we
have like a couple of hundred checklists

basically that we set up, and then
we make sure that nothing that ever

happened bad to a customer, even through
our experience or their own experience

that we knew through secondhand.

We have it in our knowledge
base, and we make sure that that

doesn't happen to our customers.

So basically the reason why you should
hire an agency is you don't have to

learn and collect the XP by losing,
ad spend and money through time.

But most of the time, agencies
just focus on hiring the best

people and often keep on repeating
the same mistakes as they work.

So the only solution we found is
building checklists and systems

and verifying everything nonstop.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Fantastic.

No, I, I think that's a, that's wise
because turnover is inevitable and you

know, sometimes you, have to hire quickly.

But if you have a great system that
you can replicate your success.

So, just a couple of questions in closing.

What would you say is the most
overrated metric that a lot of

companies follow, that, that you
think is not as valuable as they,

Ivan Janku: A hundred percent.

usually doesn't have anything to do
directly because the reporting is

skewed before service site tracking.

Yep, that was kind of accurate, but
now it doesn't match your p and l.

So what do you care about what it
says on the screen if it doesn't

match your p and l on top of it?

Since the beginning of advertising
on meta you always have the problem

of attributing the full value.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.

Ivan Janku: all of the traffic so often,
like I worked with Bare Performance

Nutrition way back and the discussion
was we want one ROI on our prospecting,

and it divulged into me going into heat
maps and Google Analytics and proving how

many people ended up signing up to email.

Not just so you can imagine,
they're a completely new person.

First time they see you and you
have a popup that gives 10% off, of

course you're gonna take 10% off.

And so anytime you sign up for something
like that, an email with the link or

a button that has a link shows up.

The problem with that link is
it's a new, unique link that

breaks the tracking change.

So the ad that brought you in.

Is not getting credited.

So you can bridge that through
Wicked Reports and Google

ads and stuff like that.

But still, 99% of businesses are gonna
have this issue where they just never

credit the meta for the email signups and
on and the metrics scale, it looks like

that email is just growing by itself.

To most businesses

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Mm-hmm.

Ivan Janku: to some business owners
like you cannot even imagine.

You had to push them towards not
stopping the ads because they think

hemo is gonna continue growing and
that's just gonna continue like that.

No, it's not.

Without meta, everything stops.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Right.

Okay.

that's really interesting.

Now I mean, attribution is a problem
for a huge number of companies

and for a wide variety of reasons.

I think that's a good
one to really emphasize.

Now, if somebody would like to work
with you, Yvonne, where are the best

places to find you and your company?

Ivan Janku: So our website
is digital rocket ads.com.

Through that, you can navigate to
the audit page and choose if you

want to do an audit or book a call
with me as an additional option.

If you're not a hundred percent sure
what we can do and you don't want to

go through the hassle of giving us
access, you can also sign up to a five

minute audit that we send as a video
format in which we can go over the

website, the ads on Google or methods.

So basically, without any access
externally, I bet I can find

enough problems that you will
end up booking a call with me.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Fantastic.

Well, I would definitely recommend
reaching out to Yvonne and his team.

this is a company that works under
the No BS guarantee, so I don't see

any reason why not to give them a try.

So thank you so much, Yvonne.

it was Really good to
have you on the podcast.

Ivan Janku: Thank you.

Reed Hansen, MarketSurge: Alright.

Speaker: Want to stay ahead of what's
actually working in marketing right now.

Head over to Market surge.io

and see how we're helping businesses
grow smarter, faster, and louder.

That's market surge.io

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